"My surrender has been done in a bundle," says Tita indignantly. "Other people do their surrenders by degrees, year after year; but in one year I have lost everything—my home, my money, my husband."
Margaret notes with fear that she has put her husband last in the list of her losses.
"Not that I care a fig about Maurice," continues Tita, with a tilt of her chin that would have made any man admire her. "I was delighted to get rid of him." Then, glancing at Margaret, she flings her arms round her neck again. "No; don't look at me like that. I'm a wretch. But really, Margaret, you know that Maurice was a wretch, too!"
"Well, well!" says Margaret sadly. "It seems useless to defend Maurice—you know how sorry I am for you always," she goes on gently. "To come from riches to poverty is one of the worst things the word offers; but to be very rich is not well, Tita. It clogs the mind; it takes one away from the very meaning of life. Money hardens the soul; it keeps one away from touch with the inner circle of humanity—from the misery, the sorrow, the vice! It is bad to be too rich."
"Yet you are rich, Margaret!"
"Yet—yes; and it frightens me," says she, in a low tone.
Tita rubs her cheek softly against hers.
"Yet you are not far from the kingdom of God!" says she.
The little kittenish gesture and the solemn phrase! Margaret presses
Tita to her. What a strange child she is! What a mixture!
"Neither are you, I trust," says she.